Healthcare Economics Made Easy, second edition

Book excerpt: Highly Commended in the BMA Medical Book Awards 2018! Here’s what the judges said: "This is one of the few textbooks I would suggest every clinician reads.” Healthcare Economics Made Easy 2e is a clear and concise text written for healthcare professionals and students who need to understand the basics of the subject but who do not want to wade through a specialist health economics text. This new edition builds on the success of the first edition by adding new chapters which provide a comparison across several western economies, as well as a consideration of the US healthcare system. Healthcare Economics Made Easy 2e will equip the reader with the necessary skills to make valid decisions based on the economic data and with the background knowledge to understand the health economics literature. This book provides insight into the economic methods that are used to promote public health policies, the techniques used for grading and valuing evidence and the statistics relied upon, without trying to re-train the reader as a health economist. If you are left bemused by terms such as QALY, health utility analysis and cost minimisation analysis, then this is the book for you! From reviews of the first edition: “This is a clearly written and accessible introduction to health economics... This book should prove useful to all those responsible for planning and delivering health service. It is a quick read but also a useful reference for the desk.... I would commend this book as a means by which people .... can better understand both the impact of their own practice on our health economy and also appreciate the methods that are being adopted to determine clinical practice at a regional and super-regional level.” Ulster Medical Journal, 2014